Square Dance History Project
The rich story of North American square dance finally has a home in the digital age.

Browse Items (1950 total)

Website

Squaredance music - Don Ward website

Don Ward is a longtime square dance caller and record collector. His Podbean website features examples from his collection; in many cases, he has digitized original 78 rpm records and has cleaned up… View item
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Squareback Reel walkthrough - Tony Parkes

Tony Parkes leads the walkthrough for this dance by Roger Whynot at the Dare To Be Square weekend held November 18-20, 2011, at the John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC. Recorded 19 November… View item
Moving Image

Squareback Reel - Tony Parkes

Tony Parkes calls this composition by Roger Whynot at the Dare To Be Square weekend held November 18-20, 2011, at the John C. Campbell Folk School, Brasstown, NC. The tune is "Red Apple… View item
Document

Square-Dance Figures from Northern New York State, 1931

Maud Karpeles was a close associate of Cecil Sharp, the English folksong collector and founder of the English Folk Dance Society. While in Appalachia in 1917, Sharp and Karpeles had their first… View item
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Square dancing, Berea, KY - c. 1950 style

The footage was taken and posted by John Ramsay, who writes: "The Jackson family in Berea, Kentucky got a group together to demonstrate the type of square dancing which was danced by local citizens… View item
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Square Dancing with Joe Lewis - Australia, 1952

A unique heritage clip of the Australian visit of American 'Hall of Fame' Square Dance Caller, Joe Lewis, on arrival at Essendon airport, Melbourne, in 1952, with commentary by Australian square dance… View item
Document

Square Dancing Standard and Experimental Guidelines

A flood of new calls in the early 1970s led a group called Square Dance Systems to publish a catalogue of calls, an attempt to bring order to an increasingly-complex universe of new figures. Square… View item
Website

Square Dancing on the South Side

THis radio program looks at the history of modern square dancing within the Black community in Chicago, with many groups leading up to the formation of Southside Squares. It includes an interview with… View item
Document

Square Dancing on the Eastern Shore of Maryland

This is a detailed description of square dancing in the mid-1940s in the area around Salisbury, Maryland, located on the Eastern Shore, in particular dances that took place at Fruitland, four miles… View item
Moving Image

Square Dancing on Pike's Peak - 1963

Square dancing at 14,000' — footage put online by the Pikes Peak Library. The actual dance footage starts at 1:17 in the footage, and lasts for about a minute. The added sound track is… View item
Document

Square Dancing Is NOT Out of This World

This is the text of a presentation by Joe Lewis at the 1959 National Square Dance Convention, part of a discussion of the future of square dancing.Lewis points out that the majority of dancers at the… View item
Document

Square Dancing Is Fun, But--Teach An Easy One First! (1940 article)

Article from 1940 promoting the virtues of square dancing and pointing out the necessity of teaching simple dances first. The author suggests: "The art of imitation must be used in teaching… View item